Playing Games
by hoheehum
Summary: President Rufus ShinRa isn't alarmed when Ninja/Princess Yuffie Kisaragi appears in places she shouldn't, because really, what else is new? Oh, right — her knack for raising hell. In Game.


_She is Kisaragi Yu-fei: brazen ninja vigilante, legendary materia thief, (erstwhile princess of the Previously Great but Lately Rather Touristy Nation of Wutai, but that's neither here nor there), and globetrotter of great mystery. To most, she is but a legend — the girl who comes and leaves like the shadows, master of _kakure oni_, hide and seek. To those few she deigns to acquaint herself with, she is known, simply, as—_

"Yuffie," Rufus ShinRa breathes, and, after a moment's contemplation, lets his hand drift away from the gun concealed under his jacket. He spares a glance for the low ceiling, briefly wondering how she managed to drop out of nowhere, then dismisses the question in favor of backing away: she's looking more than a little green under her oversized sailor's hat. Yuffie wobbles after him.

"Some – hnk – diplomat _you_ are." Her finger bobs reproachfully beneath the CEO's nose. "Not even botherin' to invite mmmk — _me_. They oughta fire you." She pauses, thoughtful, then adds, "_Hrk_."

Frowning, he waves her hand away. "Don't throw up in here."

"Don't have your damn _coronation_ on a boat! Hurp!" She groans and flops on his bed, laying on her side.

Rufus opens his mouth, closes it, chooses a different tack. Flicking strawberry-blond bangs out of his eyes he admits, mild as a mote of dust, "Well, it was going to be on the SEC _Highwind_ — that is, the airship." His reward is the widening of her eyes as she lurches upright and pinballs across the cabin into the head. He grimaces at the sound of her retching. "Alas," settling into the space she vacated, he allows himself a fleeting smile of victory, "it wasn't ready in time."

Yuffie reappears in the doorway of the facilities a minute later, one arm pressed to the bulkhead for balance, and _glares_ at him.

"I threw up on your bathroom floor."

"I heard the toilet."

A fiercer glare. "Yeah, well. I shoulda." Then she rolls her eyes and stomps, a tad drunkenly, over to stand in front of him. She props her fists on boyish hips, and he startles her by speaking first.

"Why are you here?"

"_Here_, here?" A tapped foot and waved hand indicate his elegantly appointed cabin. "To, _mmk_, bother you, mostly."

"You heard about the old man." _Came to see for yourself_, he doesn't add.

"Well," she temporizes, picking up on the unspoken accusation because when they met he pulled her pigtails, and was less cautious with his hang-ups, "I was in the area. Nobody could pin you down. Said you were hurt, or dead, or missing, or whatever. Then I was in Junon — lower Junon, and ju-_heez_, you need to do something about that place, 'cause it is a _total_ wreck. But anyway, I was there, an' alla sudden everyone was all 'Rufus' this, and 'New Era' that." She drops down next to him on the bed.

With a hooded look he widens the space between them. "And so you stowed away on my ship, and likely severely concussed one of my sailors to steal your... disguise. You'll be covering the workers comp., so that we're clear. You did receive an official invitation, by the way. Or would have, had you been in Wutai."

"Tsk," she says sweetly, "you do care."

He exhales lightly and scoots back to sit against the brace of pillows. From the night table he takes his phone, and begins filing through the schedule for his arrival in Costa. With luck, she'll grow bored and flutter off to bother someone else, maybe get caught and thrown in the brig, but Rufus doesn't put much stock in luck, especially where Yuffie Kisaragi is concerned. Indeed, he's aware of her migrating to the foot of the bed and crossing her legs under herself, settling in. The white of her over-large sailor suit is a floppy shape at the tops of his eyes.

"I heard it was Sephiroth what offed your pops," she offers, after a curiously comfortable silence.

"There are many rumors." Rufus doesn't bother looking up. "One ex-employee insisted it was the ghost of an overweight musician with terrible sideburns and a tasseled jump-suit."

"Sheesh."

He attempts to edge her off the bed with a subtle shift of his feet. She cottons on instantly, and her response is to hop over his feet and sit on his legs.

This succeeds in drawing his attention away from the phone. "Do you—"

"I do mind. See, Rufflepuff," and she barrels over his sharp look at the nickname, too, "I was traveling with — wow. Hey, those tranqs in your bathroom work really well! I was going to try to barf on you but I'm not even a _little_ queasy any more!"

Still leaning away, he glares at her, waiting for her to continue, but she seems wholly distracted.

"You were traveling _with_...?" he prompts.

"Oh! Yeah. So, see, I'd be all for Sideburns McJumpsuit, too, except that I happened to travel with a coupla people _in the know_. If you get me."

"I don't get you, but I'm sure I'd try much harder if you removed yourself from my legs."

"Why, they fall asleep?"

"No, but—"

"Okay, well, tell me when they fall asleep, and then I'll get off." She taps the side of her nose. "Super secret ninja technique."

"Right. Super secret ShinRa technique involves me shooting you if you don't remove yourself in the next three seconds. One. Two."

"Shoot me, and I can't tell you about AVALANCHE."

He stills completely. Only for a fraction of an instant, but she is sitting on his legs and watching him with every ounce of her considerable (if under-employed) observational skills.

"If you mean that they're active again, then I'm afraid you're a little behind the times, Lady Kisaragi." It's her turn to glower at the name-calling. "They did blow up a Midgar reactor. It's rather difficult not to notice them after that."

"Uh-huh. 'Cept _you_ aren't _paying_ these guys. And, for the record, I told you that was a bad idea."

"I don't recall asking your opinion."

"No, you just asked me to feed you cannon fodder for your 'ecoterrorist resistance group.' Like even back then I wouldn't realize you had no _real_ interest in _destroying_ ShinRa Company. Idiot."

"So you knowingly coerced twenty-two of your people into going off to be 'cannon fodder?' Some princess you are."

Her eyes glint, and Rufus instinctively lurches forward and crosses his arms in front of himself. For such tiny fists, the power behind them is tremendous, and Rufus grunts as they impact his arm. At least he defended her original target, he thinks with a faint cringe. Something else occurs to him, belatedly.

"Are you saying," he grits out into the tension while she hovers over him, deciding whether to attack again, "that AVALANCHE is on my ship, right now?"

Her scowl darkens, but his words do the trick and she sits back. Still, he notes with a frown, on his legs. His toes are beginning to prickle.

"I left those suckers behind in Junon, or I'd never have been able to get on this stupid friggin' _boat_ of yours."

"Ship."

"_Water floaty thing_. But I still heard some real interesting stuff from them before we parted ways."

"Before you ditched them, you mean."

"Potato, chocobo. Stop correcting me." There's still that flintlock look in her eye, so he keeps talking.

"And so the _terrorist cell_ called AVALANCHE — responsible for seventy-three deaths and the destruction of millions of gil in private property this past month alone — _told_ you," one pale eyebrow tilts at her, "that General Sephiroth killed the old man. Despite Sephiroth being severely dead himself for nigh on five years now."

Yuffie cants her head like an inquisitive bird, an impression enhanced by the sudden magpie gleam in her silver-grey eyes. Wary of this flip in her demeanor, Rufus looks back at her cooly.

"They would be in a position to know, of course," he continues blithely, flexing his feet, "since they stormed ShinRa Headquarters that very same night. Perhaps they were even present, when 'Sephiroth' beheaded ShinRa? Figuratively speaking, of course. ShinRa the man was actually pinned to his office desk with a sword — spinal cord very neatly severed — and then left to exsanguinate." _Poetic_, is the term.

Rufus realizes he may have crossed a line when she settles back, her bony hindquarters resting on his shins, and actually looks troubled. But when she speaks, her voice is business-even.

"So. You think AVALANCHE finally managed to do in your dad? All these years after they kicked you and your funding, and your information, and your fancy ol' _agenda_ straight to the curb. It's funny, 'cause I don't think anybody's left from the old days. Like, I'd be shocked if even one of 'em remembers your little 'hostile takeover' plan." She taps her chin, and ignores his blistering-cold look. "I'm pretty sure your _terrorist cell_ is _actually_ out to save the world, now."

"You're the one who spent time with them," he says through his teeth. "You tell me."

"Meh." Skinny shoulders hike in a flippant shrug. "I kinda tuned it out whenever they went all 'skinnamarinkydoo hippy rant around the bonfire.' Point is, the old guy still wound up dead."

"Maybe it was just fate," he drawls lowly. They lock eyes, one heir to another, and snort quietly.

"Remember that time," Yuffie says suddenly, leaning back on her hands by wrapping them around his ankles, "you guys came to Wutai during the Autumn Fair, and your dad bought us both those whirligig whistles. And we made up that song on them about how he needed to trim his mustache before it grew up his nose to his brain? And he laughed so hard we thought he was gonna keel over and croak?"

For the window of an instant Rufus is pale and drawn, the ghost of tension around his eyes. Then his face darkens, one corner of his pressed lips pulling straight back.

"I remember that by the next year's Autumn Fair the old man was sick of diplomacy, and sent General Sephiroth into Wutai's northern provinces with the Company's army. They marched right over the town of Dai Chou, which, unless I'm mistaken," and they both know he's not, "is where the legend of the spinning whistle that quelled the summer sun had its origins."

"Yeah," she mutters. "I remember that, too."

* * *

They lapse into silence, and his phone chimes a timely call. It takes fifteen minutes to convince a frantic investor Rufus isn't going to start throwing money down the space program, and five more minutes to verify that an extremely confused Mr. Palmer was, indeed, the source of the relevant rumor. Dictating to his secretary a frost-bitten reprimand to be sent to the executive in question, a distracted inch of his mind warns that Yuffie looks alarmingly thoughtful. When he hangs up, the sound of the ocean creeps in, and they stare at one another in perfect silence for over a minute.

"What did you think about the old man dropping the plate on Sector Seven?" she breaks it. Rufus goes very still, expression neutral as he peers back at her. She doesn't give him a chance to speak.

"Because all the news people say that it was AVALANCHE that dropped the plate. Climbed that ginormous support pillar, hacked the maintenance controls," sitting forward again, her hands describe the scene with vivid gestures, "fought off ShinRa Co.'s brave attempts to save the day, and toppled an eighth of the city of Midgar down on itself. Right on the heads of their own friends and families, and homes and hideouts and whatnot, down below in the slums. Six-point-five-_hundred_-_thousand_ casualties." She cocks her head at him again, like a bird, and he realizes his mistake an instant before she slings it back at him. "But you only said they were responsible for seventy-three deaths, and the bombing of a reactor."

Silence presses in, but for the sound of the ship around them.

"I misspoke," he says at last, stony.

"Yeah." She gives him a wry look that's much too old for her. "I figured."

A rough concussion breaks their stare-down, and they both twist to look out his window. It faces the sea, aesthetic but useless. Another hollow bang, and then the moan of stressing metal. Yuffie turns green again. The door bursts inward seconds later on a panting young officer in too much brocade.

"Sir! AVALANCHE was spotted onboard, and there's some sort of horrible monster attacking people in the hold!" If the messenger has anything else to add, he swallows it visibly when he registers the president is sitting on his bed with a small, boyish sailor in his lap. Yuffie, inspired, makes a convincing show of ducking her face away and tugging at her fly.

"AVALANCHE," Rufus breathes, and snaps his stare back to the princess.

Face still turned away from the officer in artistic shame, she offers ShinRa an impish wink.

"Sir, sorry, very sorry," she mutters in the deepest, most wretched voice her skinny ribcage can muster, hops off Rufus's legs and darts out the door with her hat pulled down to hide her face.

The officer, pretending with all his might not to see anything interesting, lets her go. "Sir," he squeaks, "Director Heidegger has ordered your helicopter ready—"

Rufus passes through his shock and lunges off the bed in wide-eyed fury, one hand slicing the air. "_Get that_—"

Numb legs give out at the knee and he topples with a furious shout, as needling little fires dance across his feet and up his calves. The terrified officer lurches forward, only to backpedal rapidly under a hoarfrost snarl.

"Get that sailor!" Rufus hisses, but he's known since he was ten that she would always win hide-and-seek.


End file.
